ArticleProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America2023
Evolutionary predictors of the specific colors of birds.
Article in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 2023. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 27 papers.
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Who cites it
27 citing papers in PubMed, 58 citations in OpenAlex.
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- Acoustic and visual traits predict species nuclearity in Neotropical mixed-species bird flocks.Oecologia · 2026Article
- Habitat Fragmentation in Urbanized Landscapes Favors Bird Species With Darker Plumage.Ecology and evolution · 2026Article
- Bird Community Colours Across Different Types of Habitat.Animals : an open access journal from MDPI · 2026Article
- Sexual Dimorphism in Fin Size and Shape in Bluefin Killifish.Ecology and evolution · 2026Article
- Article
- Aberrant Pigmentation in a Schooling Cownose Ray (Ecology and evolution · 2026Article
- Evidence for the evolution of male and female cardinals' plumage colouration being affected by both natural and sexual selection.BMC ecology and evolution · 2025Article
- Biochemical and Genomic Underpinnings of Carotenoid Colour Variation Across a Hybrid Zone Between South Asian Flameback Woodpeckers.Molecular ecology · 2025Article
- Cloud Inspired White and Grey Plasmonic Metasurfaces for Camouflaged Thermal Management.Advanced materials (Deerfield Beach, Fla.) · 2025Article
- Pigment contribution to feather mass depends on melanin form and is restricted to approximately 25.Biology letters · 2025Article
- Global patterns of colouration complexity in the Paridae: Effects of climate and species characteristics across body regions.The Journal of animal ecology · 2025Article
- Gloger's Rule or Historical Conjecture? Tests in Mammals.Ecology and evolution · 2025Article
- Life history and nesting traits reflect urban tolerance in coastal birds.Royal Society open science · 2025Article
- A complete and dynamic tree of birds.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2025Article
- Nestling Plumage Colour Variation in a Sexually Dichromatic Hole-Nesting Passerine Bird-Potential Functions and Mechanisms.Ecology and evolution · 2025Article
- Six-decade research bias towards fancy and familiar bird species.Proceedings. Biological sciences · 2025Article
- Viewing conditions predict evolutionary diversity in avian plumage colour.Proceedings. Biological sciences · 2025Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
5 authors at 2 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Animal coloration is one of the most conspicuous aspects of human-perceived organismal diversity, yet also one of the least understood. In particular, explaining why species have specific colors (e.g., blue vs. red) has proven elusive. Here, we quantify for nearly all bird species, the proportion of the body covered by each of 12 human-visible color categories, and test whether existing theory can predict the direction of color evolution. The most common colors are black, white, gray and brown, while the rarest are green, blue, purple, and red. Males have more blue, purple, red, or black, whereas females have more yellow, brown, or gray. Sexual dichromatism is partly due to sexual selection favoring ornamental colors in males but not in females. However, sexual selection also correlated positively with brown in both sexes. Strong social selection favors red and black, colors used in agonistic signaling, with the strongest effects in females. Reduced predation risk selects against cryptic colors (e.g., brown) and favors specific ornamental colors (e.g., black). Nocturnality is mainly associated with brown. The effects of habitat use support the sensory drive theory for camouflage and signaling. Darker colors are more common in species living in wet and cold climates, matching ecogeographical rules. Our study unambiguously supports existing theories of color evolution across an entire class of vertebrates, but much variation remains unexplained.
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